


i'll burn it down (build it up better)

by ohmygodwhy



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Character Study, Dealing With Trauma, Episode Tag, Family Feels, Fred is a good dad, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, hearing impaired Jughead, no shade but ep 7 gets me every time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-15
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-12-15 02:49:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11796855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohmygodwhy/pseuds/ohmygodwhy
Summary: he sits, legs crossed, fingers laced tight tight together in his lap in the one and only interrogation room at the station, and thinks about the way his dad had gripped his shoulders, looking up at him where he was crouched down—people like us,he had said,we always get thrown under the bus; it's all bullshit, though, you hear me? don't listen to a goddamn word they say.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> the doc title for this is 'that good ep 7 jughead angst' and i think that sums it up well
> 
> alternate title: y is fred the only reliable parent in this entire goddamn town

 

Jughead settles into the Andrews’ household like a child sinking into a beanbag. The way you fall into your bed after a long day, the pillow still indented from the night before, the perfect place to rest your head. Familiar, and easy. 

The place has been practically a second home to him since he was like seven, maybe even younger. He knows it like the back of his hand, knows it like he knows the sound of his father’s voice or the click of the keys on his laptop keyboard. He almost broke his arm trying to slide down the banister on a dare when he was nine. He’s poured cereal into the same bowl for years, the blue one with the chip in the rim from that time Archie scared the shit out of him and he’d dropped his cereal everywhere. Fred had made Archie clean it up all by himself. Jughead had watched, arms crossed in eleven-year-old reckoning, laughing the whole time. 

The thing is that it’s easy here, the creak of the front door and the annoying way Archie liked to leave his window open during the night sometimes—it should be easy. 

He settles in, slow and soft and fast all at once. He drops the backpack full of everything he owns, his entire livelihood, on the floor behind Archie’s bedroom door. They pull a mattress out from somewhere, throw some sheets and make a makeshift bed that’s better than anything Jughead’s slept on in over half a year. He makes it his own within a few nights. His laptop finds a place on the floor under the window, near the wall so it can charge. 

He never completely unpacks. He still carries half his life to school and back everyday. He doesn’t know why he does it, but he just—can’t bring himself to empty out his backpack. Doesn’t wanna lay everything out in the open, bare everything to the world, because there’s so little to bare. There’s not much worth anything at all.

Archie always looks at him like he’s worth something; Jughead doesn’t wanna prove him wrong quite yet, so he keeps half his stuff tucked away, and only panics a little bit when Fred takes him out to buy some new clothes, because there’s nowhere else to put them. He decides, in the back of his mind, that if he has to leave, he might just leave them here. Or maybe he could use a grocery bag or something, he doesn’t know. 

“You doing okay in there?” Fred asks through the dressing room door, voice carefully casual. They’re the only ones in the dressing room right now, so his voice echoes a little. Archie is at extended varsity football practice.

Jughead jumps just a little bit, head snapping up. He meets his own eyes in the mirror—tired and dull, like dirty water—and can only hold it for a moment before he has to look away. 

“Yeah,” he says, “I’m fine.”

“You sure? You need anything in a different size?”

The jeans he’s trying on right now are a little on the big side, hang a little too low on his hips, but they’re comfortable. They’re fine. He’s taken up enough time as it is, anyways, has a pile of new shirts and flannels and even a new jacket in the corner that Fred isn’t gonna let him pay for.

“No,” he says, watching his mouth move in the mirror, “I’m good.”

 

Nobody, save Archie and Betty, really looks surprised when Jughead is walked down the school hallway by the principal and the actual sheriff on either side of him, like they’re ready to throw him in a box and lock away the key. Nobody seems shocked. 

It’s like they expected it, all of them. Or maybe he’s just projecting, maybe they don’t give a damn anymore—so many people have been on the chopping block, lately, it’s hard to keep up if you’re not actively trying to. Besides, Good Riverdale Kids don’t obsessively track the murder investigation of a fellow student, the sheriff’s eyes say, they just wait for the culprit to be found.

Jughead has never been a Good Riverdale Kid. A bitter, tired part of him is surprised they didn’t come for him sooner. 

The sheriff slams his truck door shut after Jughead ducks inside, and Jughead thinks about how angry his dad had been over the whole 5th Grade ‘Arson Attempt’, the way he’d looked at the teachers, the principle, vicious and blaming. 

He sits, legs crossed, fingers laced tight tight together in his lap in the one and only interrogation room at the station, and thinks about the way his dad had gripped his shoulders, looking up at him where he was crouched down— _people like us,_ he had said, _we always get thrown under the bus; it’s all bullshit, though, you hear me? don’t listen to a goddamn word they say._

He hadn’t known if his dad was talking about Jughead, or if he was talking about himself; he still doesn’t know, picking at a hangnail on his left thumb, waiting for someone to come and talk to him already. Maybe he was talking about both of them, father and son, tree and apple. He’d always thought his apple fell far, but now he thinks his father had sat in a chair just like this, once, in a room just like this, once, not picking at his nails because he was probably tougher and meaner than Jughead was, even back then.

He wonders if his dad had been scared. He wonders how many times it happened, and wonders if there was a certain number of times it could happened before you just stopped being afraid, afraid your life would be over, afraid this would be It. Jughead doesn’t know if he could ever reach that. Doesn’t know if he would want to. 

The first time, no one believed it was an accident, shipped him off to be hidden from society for a while and rethink his arsonist ways. 

He doesn’t want to think about what will happen if they don’t believe him this time. 

Right now, he doesn’t want to be his father’s son, because he thinks that’s all the sheriff will see.Poverty and matches and an alcoholic dad with a history of his own. 

He is a cliche, the product of a machine. A Southside kid with a life already paved: he won’t go to college; he’ll probably never leave this godforsaken town. What does it matter if he spends life in a jail cell instead of some trailer, writing books that will never be published? He can do that from jail. It would make a good story. 

Sheriff Keller, he thinks when the man walks in, pulls up a chair all slow like they do in the movies, is also a cliche. He wears his badge and it’s shiny, shinier than anything Jughead owns or will ever be. The product of a machine, doing his job. 

His job is to rip the suspect open and watch them spill their guts.

“You have a long and rough history, Mr. Jones,” he says, low and direct.

He lays Jughead’s life out on the cool metal table, painting his own picture with the scrawled C’s and D’s and juvie records. 

Jughead is a cliche but he isn’t _that_ kind of cliche—he wouldn’t do something like that. How could he _ever_ do something like that? How could they ever think he could? 

He feels like he is drowning, but if he gasps for air it will be seen as a sign of some sort of confession, maybe, some sort of guilt, of fear, of something he doesn’t want to be seen.

The room is empty when the sheriff leaves, but it feels so small he could choke. 

 

He owns too much, now, after the shopping trip. Fred had bought him some new school supplies, too, after Jughead had thrown all his notes away, ripped up his doodles and half-scrawled daydreams and anything else they could use against him. 

His backpack is too small to hold everything. He considers getting another one, but two backpacks will be too much to carry around with him, once he has to leave. 

A part of him thinks that maybe he should unpack, take the dresser drawer Archie’s offered him. So far he’s folded up one of his jackets and an older pair of jeans and left the rest of it empty. Not his favorites, by far—if he has to pack up in a hurry, he won’t cry over leaving them behind. 

His new jacket won’t fit into his backpack, which looks overstuffed already, too suspicious to carry around with him everywhere—god, especially now. He doesn’t know what to do. He’s so tired. 

He sits there, like that, legs folded underneath him, doesn’t realize how long until Archie walks in, smelling like grass and football practice. 

“Jug?” he hears, and looks up. Archie has a grass stain on his cheek. He wonders if he knows, or if no one bothered to tell him.

“You have a grass stain on your cheek,” he says, because he’s an asshole but he’s also a decent person. 

Archie nods, smiling vaguely, “Yeah, I know, I’m gonna go shower,” and then, “You okay, Jug?”

He wishes the Andrews’ would stop asking him that. Lord knows they have enough going on already. 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he says like he always does, and looks again at his overflowing backpack. 

He hears the floor creak as Archie sets his own backpack down, feet padding across the floor as he walks over, crouches down beside him. He’s warm, even through that heavy blue and gold fabric. He wonders if Archie wears it to practice, too, and would laugh at his own joke if he was anywhere else but here. 

“I don’t think you have enough room in there, Jug,” he says, voice light and teasing. It makes Jughead’s stomach clench. 

“I know,” he says, fist clenching at the fabric of his jeans, “I’m not sure what to do about it.”

“You have a drawer, now,” Archie offers, like it’s nothing, like he doesn’t know Jughead has nothing more than this, “And if there’s not enough room, you can take part of the closet.”

Jughead snorts, “I’m taking your floor, I’m not gonna take your closet, too.”

“It won’t be taking if I’m offering.”

“You just said taking.”

“Sure, but not like _taking_ -taking. You make it sound like you’re stealing,” he laughs a little.

Jughead just shrugs. 

“It’s fine,” he says, “I’ll figure it out. You should take a shower, you smell like a football player.”

“I _am_ a football player,” Archie says. And then, “We can figure out what to do after I shower, yeah?” 

Jughead bites his lips hard, and blinks hard, and nods. 

“Okay,” he says. That sounds nice. He’s made so many big decisions, lately; he doesn’t really wanna make another one. 

“Cool,” Archie smiles, gives part of himself away whenever he does, all bright and sincere, and uses Jughead’s shoulder to push himself up. 

“Hey, Jug?” he says, hovering halfway out the bedroom door. Jughead looks up again, “I really don’t mind if you use the closet.”

Jughead just looks at him for a long moment, and Archie just looks back. He feels something in his chest tighten painfully, and then give out. He swallows hard, looks away, nods.

“Okay.”

Archie smiles again. 

 

His father doesn’t show up until after Fred Andrews offers up a fake alibi and gets him out of that godawful room. 

He looks hungover, in that messy, next morning kind of way—not drunk, not even buzzed, but somehow not clear-headed enough to be sober. It’s not unfamiliar. 

“Don’t make things worse,” he whispers, clutching at the fabric of his dad’s shirt, unwashed. “Please.” 

His dad deflates immediately, like someone flipped a switch, turned his righteous anger off and replaced it with guilt. His hands always shake when he’s feeling guilty—and they shake more when he’s sober than when he’s drunk. 

He cups Jughead’s jaw and he promises he’ll make things better. He’ll set things straight, get his shit together, maybe even show up for work tomorrow. 

He thinks that they’ve been here so many times. Ten years old in front of the locked down elementary school, eleven when he’d come home with a broken nose and scraped knuckles and note from the principle because both his parents were too busy to show up when she called. When FP lost his first job, bending down to tell him not to worry about a thing, just because mom and dad fight doesn’t mean they don’t still love each other. 

Jughead is tall enough now that his dad doesn’t have to bend down at all if he doesn’t want to, but he does anyways, force of habit, maybe, leans forward like a man in repentance. His hands shake against the skin of Jughead’s neck. They’re cold. 

“You believe that,” his eyes are rimmed red the way they always are, these days; Jughead thinks about the way he’d begged him not to leave, and the way he’d almost listened, “Don’t you?”

“Yeah,” he says; his dad looks so tired, the way Jughead feels, “I believe you.” 

He thinks that he’s the only one who does. He thinks about the way the sheriff had looked at him across the table, and supposes that the apple doesn’t fall far after all.

 

“Did my dad ever get arrested?” 

Fred looks up from where he’s bent over the island in the kitchen, scrawling out numbers for construction shipments orders or something else that Jughead doesn’t pretend to understand. 

“What was that?”

He looks stressed enough that Jughead feels bad for distracting him, but he thinks that if he backs out now, he won’t ever ask again, even if he already knows the answer.

“My dad,” he repeats, “Did he ever get arrested? When you were younger?”

If Fred is surprised by the question, he doesn’t show it. Just sighs, rubbing at his eyes and putting his pencil down.

“Once or twice, yeah.”

“Was he ever guilty?”

Fred thinks for a long moment, “Maybe,” he says, “But never completely.”

He doesn’t know what that means. Guilty of the crime or just guilty of the background. Maybe they’re one in the same, in this town. 

“Oh,” he says, “Did you always bail him out?”

Fred’s lips twitch a little at that, something that could be fond if they weren’t talking about Jughead’s father and jail time, “Pretty much, yeah.”

“Like you did for me?”

Fred’s ghost of a smile drops. He pushes himself up onto his hands, braced against the counter. 

“You’re not your father, Jughead,” he says. 

“But I could be,” he says, “In a few years, I could be.”

Fred shakes his head, “I knew FP when he was your age. You aren’t him.” 

Jughead says nothing, picks at a hangnail on his right thumb, this time. 

“You don’t think I did it, right?”

“God, Jug, of course I don’t.”

“Do you think my dad could’ve? Done something like this, I mean. Do you think he ever has?”

“I,” a long pause, Jughead stops picking when it starts to sting, glances up instead; Fred meets his eyes carefully, “I don’t know. I’d like to think not. Your dad’s a lot of things, but I don’t think he’s a killer.” 

Jughead nods. It feels solid, coming from someone like Fred. It feels tangible. Honest.

“Alright,” he says, “Thanks.”

The conversation drifts into something easier—how school is going, the lit. essay due Friday and how Jughead still doesn’t know what he’s writing about even though it’s already Tuesday. He has to fix the waist of his new jeans three times, because he forgot to put a belt on this morning.

Fred notices, because he’s a dad, the good kind of dad, and he notices these things.

“You should’ve told me you needed a smaller size,” he says. His mouth is curled into a teasing half smile and his eyebrows are raised, but Jughead feels a hot wave of shame course through him all the same. Of course he should have, he thinks, reprimanding. 

“Sorry,” he manages, looking at the ground. 

“Jug, hey,” he sounds concerned, now, which is worse, a warm hand on his shoulder, “I’m just teasing. We can go and return them for a different size, it’s no big deal.” 

Jughead swallows hard, shakes his head, “No, that’s okay. They’re fine. People invented belts for a reason. I’ll…grow into them.” 

A pause, “You sure?”

Jughead looks up, into Fred Andrews’ worried eyes. He seems very old, older than he’s ever seemed before. It’s weird, Jughead thinks, even when he trudged down the stairs after Archie refused to see him on one of his Bad days, he didn’t seem this old. He wonders if it’s him. Wonders if it’s his dad.

Jughead nods. “I’m sure. I don’t wanna be any more trouble.”

“Hey,” he says again, warm, like a broken record, “You’re no trouble, Jug. If you need anything, you can tell me. I’m not gonna get mad over a smaller pant size.”

Jughead smiles a little, forces one side of his mouth up, so he can distract from the heat building behind his eyes for no damn reason. He’s felt so loose lately, wrung out and left to dry. He needs to get over himself soon. 

“Okay,” he says, “Thanks, Mr. A.” 

Fred pulls him into a loose hug, pats his back the way he used to do when he was younger. It’s such a fatherly action it makes something in him _ache_. 

He cries a little. He feels so young. Fred seems so so old. 

 

The drive back from the sheriff’s station is loaded and tense. It’s the two of them, he and his dad, in his dad’s shitty old pick-up truck. He wonders, vaguely, how he managed to keep this but lose the house. 

The thing is that his dad is driving him to the Andrews’ house instead of what used to be their own house, because an old couple lives there now and Jughead still isn’t ready to move back into the trailer.

His dad is sober, which is good because he’s the one driving, his knuckles turning white where they’re gripping at the steering wheel too hard. He has something the wants to say, probably. Something he probably won’t say. Maybe he’ll say it once Jughead is halfway out the door, something scathing, or maybe something to make him think, so he can shut the door and drive away before Jughead can get a word in. 

He has his backpack shoved down in front of the passenger seat, pressed up against his shins, his entire life zipped up tight. He wonders if his dad saved any of the shit he left back at the trailer when he moved out. He thinks he left his copy Crime and Punishment tucked into the couch, but he hasn’t gotten around to asking about it. 

His dad pulls up to the Andrews’ house, puts the truck in park, and says “This is all bullshit.”

Jughead blinks.

“The investigation, I mean. You never killed no one. It’s bullshit that they think you did. This town doesn’t give a shit about people like us unless they want a suspect.” 

Jughead says nothing, because he already knows. He’s been trying to ignore it, but he knows. 

“I’m,” his dad starts, and stops, and starts again, “I’m gonna get it together. Soon. I promise, okay?”

Jughead looks up, “Okay.”

His dad nods, “Make sure Fred treats you right, yeah? You better not be sleeping in the back yard,” his voice is deliberately light, but Jughead can hear something bitter and sad underneath it; it makes him feel guilty, so he huffs a laugh and clicks the door open.

“I will,” he says, heaving his backpack over his shoulder. Archie opens the front door, light pouring out into the yard.

His dad opens his mouth, like maybe he’ll finally say what he’s wanted to say since he started the car. Jughead waits, one beat, two. 

His dad reaches over to pull the passenger door shut, and waves goodbye through the window. 

 

Jughead takes all his school supplies out first—they’re near the top of the pile, because he uses them everyday. He stacks them up, notebooks, textbooks, stray pens and pencils and a few highlighters. They’re reading Frankenstein in school right now; his copy, paperback, is a little bit bent. He puts it at the top of the stack. His laptop has been charging since he got home from school. 

The rest of his books come next, and the poster he took from the drive-in, spare batteries for his hearing aid, the flashlight he keeps the front pocket.

The clothes come last; he unzips the backpack as much as he can and dumps all of it onto the floor, carefully puts all his notebooks and pens back inside.

He drops the backpack in its spot behind the bedroom door, and decides he’ll use half of the closet. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> comment to get my through physics this year our teacher does not know how to teach we're all gonna fail


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He thinks that maybe he should get rid of his novel. The one about Jason. It’s incriminating. It’s—weird, writing about a dead classmate. Even if he tried to explain that it was more than that, tried to pull out the heart of it, nobody would listen. Nobody ever listens, especially not to him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some more vaguely-ep7 nonsense that didn't rlly fit in anywhere but here
> 
> alt title: i just want more jug living w the andrews content

 

On Sunday mornings, Jughead makes pancakes. Blueberry, or maybe chocolate chip, depending on the general mood and available ingredients. He tried to make banana pancakes once, but gave up and threw some eggo waffles in the toaster instead.

It’s easy work. He’s done it dozens of times, Jellybean stirring the batter on lazy weekend mornings, or his dad, half awake on the couch and too dead to the world to do anything but complain about being hungry. It’s the least he can do, anyways. The Andrews are giving him a roof and food and new clothes and shit, so he can make pancakes for everyone on Sundays.

It’s quiet, this morning. Fred had left earlier because some little thing had gone wrong at the construction sight and he was the only one competent enough to fix it. Jughead had considered asking if it had something to do with his dad, but decided he didn’t wanna know.

So it’s just the two of them, he and Archie. Archie’s sitting, scrolling through his phone, still half-asleep, humming faintly. It’s an unfamiliar tune.

“That a new song or something?” Jughead asks, carefully breaking the quiet. The window is cracked open, but it’s early enough that not many cars are driving by. Sunday is everyone's favorite day to not do shit.

Archie blinks out of his daze, “Uh, maybe?”

“Maybe?” Jughead repeats, flipping a pancake.

Archie shrugs, looking bashful, “I have the tune to the chorus part, but I’m not sure what do to with it yet.”

Jughead hums in understanding. Sometimes sentences flow together in his head that have nothing to do with anything, but they’re pretty enough that he keeps them around in case they fit in somewhere eventually. Two different kinds of writing, he thinks.

“Well, tell me when you come up with the rest.”

A pause, “You like it?”

Jughead, working on piling the ready pancakes up on a plate, glances up. Archie looks surprised.

“Yeah, I like it. I think it sounds nice. Like, not too sad but not too commercial jingle, either.”

Archie smiles, looking pleased.

“What’s that look for?” Jughead teases.

Archie shrugs, “I dunno. I guess I never really thought you, y'know, actually liked my songs and stuff.”

Jughead blinks, actually kind of offended, “I said the one at that town event was nice, didn’t I?”

“You said it ‘wasn’t bad’,”

“That’s like the same thing,” he laughs, “But I really did like it. And this one.”

“For real?”

“Yeah, for real. It’s like, another kind of writing, just with music. More like poetry.”

Archie’s eyebrows do that thing that means he’s thinking, a faint smile as he considers. It’s a nice look on him. Better than how he’s been looking lately, ever since that shit woman left town, left him in ruins.

“Poetry, huh?” He asks, tilting his head to the side, “Does that make me the new Robert Frost?”

That startles a laugh out of Jughead, mostly because he didn’t know Archie knew who Robert frost was.

“You’re more like…Dickinson. Or Poe, sad as some of your songs are.”

“You’re comparing my music to the horror genre?”

Jughead shrugs, unapologetic, “He wrote poems, too.”

Archie rolls his eyes. “And he wrote stories—like you.”

“Oh, so now you’re comparing me to the horror genre?”

“We’re both like…half of Edgar Allen Poe.”

“That doesn’t make sense.”

Archie smiles, like it’s obvious, “I get the poetry, you get the stories.”

“Shit, you get The Raven.”

“Oh, is that the one about that talking raven?"

“No, it’s the one about the talking pigeon,” Jughead says flatly. 

Archie laughs. His laugh is so damn contagious. He could stop worlds with that laugh. God, maybe he is Edgar Allen Poe. He’s had to check the tone of his novel sometimes because it sounded too melodramatic. He’ll reread it over again and everything sounds fucking melodramatic, the side-effect of a small town murder.

He’s a cliche, though, so it’s okay. It fits the mold. Archie seems to like it, anyways, whenever Jughead feels comfortable enough to let him read a paragraph or two. He always wonders how Archie lets everyone listen to his songs so easily, like he doesn’t realize he’s leaving a part of himself open for everyone to see.

Everything’s always out in the open with Archie, giving an exaggerated thumbs up when he takes his first bite, and maybe that’s what makes him so safe.

 

When his dad remembers to buy them, Jughead cooks eggs in the morning. They’re his dad’s favorite Day-After, hangover foods, so he’s gotten pretty good at cooking them just right—took a few times burning them when he was twelve to get the hang of it, but dad never complains about them anymore. Hangover dad is easier to deal with than drunk dad. He’s quiet when he’s hungover, not as brash. Doesn’t yell, or cry, or over-feel whatever he’s feeling like he does when he’s drunk. He’s agreeable, even, thanks him when he brings him his coffee and eggs, even says a soft goodbye when he heads out for school.

It makes him feel old, thinking like that. He makes breakfast for his dad the way his dad used to for him—and his dad burned the eggs himself half the time, but it was the thought that counted. It makes him feel like an adult, the way the roles are switched. It bothers him, at first, because it shouldn't be that way, and then he stops thinking about it, so it doesn’t bother him as much. He has a job now, down at the drive-in, so he’s halfway to being an adult already.

He turns the oven on, washes the skillet he used yesterday that no one bothered to wash last night. The handle is worn down, shows how it’s been used over the years, again and again. He’s the only one that uses it, now, so he likes to think that his hands fit it more than anyone’s. It’s stupid, insignificant, but it brings a little smile to his lips when he cracks the eggs open against the counter.

“Hey Jug,” his dad says, hobbling through the kitchen like an old man.

“Hey,” he answers, holding steady when his dad pats on the shoulder; he isn’t sure whether it’s affection that has his hand so heavy, or if it’s just the only way he can keep himself upright.

“You makin' breakfast?” He asks, and Jughead nods, resists the urge to say something stupid about how it’s cooking three feet away. 

His dad makes his way into the tiny living room and collapses on the couch, spreads his legs out like he’s claiming his domain. Maybe he’s just stretching. Jughead has always put too much meaning into the little things. 

He finishes up quick, because he doesn’t wanna be here anymore, the air too quiet and empty. It’s just the two of them here; it’s been months now, but he still can’t get used to it. It’s like they’re mourning for people who are still alive, and Jughead hates it.

“Thanks, Jug,” his dad slurs when Jughead brings him a plate. Scrambled, like he likes. “Could you bring me the Tabasco?”

“We’re all out.”

“Could you pick some up later?”

Jughead wants to say _couldn’t you? you’re the one who’s free all day_ , but he doesn’t, because it’s not worth the argument that would come after.

“Sure,” he says. And then he grabs his backpack from the chair and his phone from the counter and says, “Bye.”

“Bye, Jug, good luck on your math test.”

“Thanks,” he says, even though the math test was last week and he’d told him about the good grade he got on it last night.

The door swings shut behind him. It’s only later that he realizes he never asked for any money for the store, and his dad never offered any.

 

Archie has Bad Days.

Fred drives him out of town every Thursday after school to talk to a therapist, and older man that Archie had only good things to say about. They don’t talk about the way the first therapist they tried made him panic—a woman, thirty at the youngest. Jughead wasn’t actually there for it, but he’s heard about it. Understands it. He gets anxious whenever the smells straight alcohol—not the same thing at all, but it’s the same concept.

Archie’s been doing better, but he has bad days. Days he won’t go to school, won’t leave his room, is barely coaxed out to eat, or let food be brought to him, Fred gently rapping on the door, patient as anything, until Archie lets him in.

Jughead never asks to be let in, because it isn’t his place, and it isn’t his right. He knows he likes to be alone when he’s feeling like shit. Time to think things over. Sort things out. He just hopes Archie doesn’t think himself into a place he can’t get back from.

Jughead gets a text, five pm, from Archie: _you can come up if u want._ And then, a minute later: _please._

Jughead stares at it for a moment, closes the book he was reading, and goes upstairs. Archie’s silent when he does, his back turned, so Jughead settles down, back against the wall right under the window, and opens his laptop. He types, overly conscious of the way the sound of his fingers over the keyboard fills the room. Archie doesn’t seem to mind, though, so he tries not to mind, either.

He spends the next hour and a half switching between an english essay due next Monday and reading useless Wikipedia articles, squinting his eyes against the light of his laptop, until he hears Archie move, sheets shifting on the bed.

“She cared about me,” he says quietly; Jughead’s fingers still, hovering over the keyboard, “She said she didn’t wanna go to the police because she didn’t want me to get in trouble. She wanted us to be together.”

Jughead looks up at him, then, the artificial light throwing shadows over his face.

“She said she cared about me. But I went to the police and I wasn’t in any danger. She said I could lose my chance at a scholarship.”

“But you didn’t,” Jughead offers.

“But I didn’t,” he agrees, “She said she cared about me, but. She cared more about herself, didn’t she?”

It’s not a question. Jughead looks at him for a long moment, and doesn’t have anything he can say to make it better.

 

Archie smuggles a bottle of his dad’s beer from the back of the fridge in the garage when they’re thirteen. Fred is out for the night, and Jughead is staying over, so they decide why the hell not in that stupid way thirteen year olds think. It’s more for the thrill of it than anything.

The beer is nasty as shit in his mouth and even worse going down his throat, but he takes a second swig to match Archie’s anyways, the curve of the bottle cool against his fingers. The smell makes him a little sick, his dad lounging on the couch, already half-drunk on a Sunday morning, but he takes a third, just to prove a point.

He’s not sure what he’s proving, but he doesn’t want Archie to think less of him.

Archie is doing worse, though, has to spit out his third sip, doubling over and coughing into the grass of his backyard. He laughs, though, and so does Jughead, because of course they’re first time drinking would go like this. Also they’re a little buzzed, lightweight thirteen year olds that they are, so everything is funny as shit.

Years later, his dad collapses on the floor of the trailer, drunk out of his goddamn mind, his goddamn heart. He smells like sweat and smoke and alcohol, a million cliches rolled into one. Everything in this goddamn town is such a cliche, he thinks, propping his dad up and dragging him to the bed as best he can. His dad puts all his weight on him, like he’s supposed to carry him like this and not the other way around. He almost loses his grip a few times, but they make it.

“Jug,” he’s saying, “Jug, Juggie, listen—I gotta tell you something, listen,”

Jughead hums in acknowledgement, but doesn’t stop untying the stupid laces on his dad’s boots.

“M'sorry, y'know? I never—meant for it to be like this, always wanted the best for you, but shit just—got fucked up, always been too goddamn useless to fix things, and ‘m sorry—you know that, right? You know that?”

“Yeah,” Jughead says, heart hammering in his chest, “I know.”

“Good,” FP slurs, “that’s good. I love you so much, Jug, I’m so so—”

“I know, dad,” Jughead says again, softer this time. Sometimes he wonders if his dad says these things on purpose, but also knows he’s never had a filter either way. Told Jughead’s third grade teacher to fuck off at his parent-teacher conference when he said Jughead’s math grades had a lot to be desired.

He opens his mouth to say something else, but when he looks up again his dad is already asleep.

 

The thing is that Jughead has bad days, too. Feels stupid because there’s no reason for them, but he wakes up terrified, convinced the sheriff is on his way to tie the noose around his neck and pull, sure he hears his dad walking up the stairs, can smell the beer on his breath.

He wonders if he should wipe the hard drive on his laptop. He spends hours thinking about it, focused on the way Archie breathes in his sleep, the sounds of peaceful nighttime suburbia pouring through the window because Archie likes to sleep with it open, curtains drawn back.

He thinks that maybe he should get rid of his novel. The one about Jason. It’s incriminating. It’s—weird, writing about a dead classmate. Even if he tried to explain that it was more than that, tried to pull out the heart of it, nobody would listen. Nobody ever listens, especially not to him.

He asks Fred, in passing, when he’s dumping his old history notes in the trash, the ones with the messy scrawl in the margins—he’d been writing the dialogue to a Tarantino movie he’d seen the night before, because it was stuck in his head like a song. Says, “Do you think I should delete my novel?”

“Why?” he asks, “You having writers block?”

“Something like that,” and then, smaller, “I don’t want the sheriff to see it.”

Fred pauses over the chicken he’s cutting, the same way Jughead pauses over his keyboard, but actually takes the time to look at him.

“Jug,” he says, “the sheriff can’t take your laptop unless he has a warrant—which he doesn’t, because you weren’t convicted of anything, because you didn’t do anything.”

Jughead is quiet, picking at his thumbnail; it’s getting a little long.

“I think your story’s great so far,” Fred adds.

“Really?”

“I’ve only seen bits and pieces, of course, but yeah, really. Archie thinks so, too.”

“Archie thinks everything is great.”

Fred laughs a little, but it’s not a happy laugh. He thought Ms Grundy was great, too, Jughead thinks.

“He does,” Fred agrees, “It’s your story, and you can do whatever you want with it, but you’re still working on it, right? I think you should see it through to the end, and see how you feel about it then.

Jughead nods, even though it isn’t really a question of how he feels about it. 

“Okay,” he says. And then, “What’s for dinner?”

Fred says he’s gonna barbecue and maybe make some mashed potatoes, too, and suddenly the whole day is better. Jughead tells him so, and Fred laughs a little, happier than before, so Jughead counts that as a win.

 

**Author's Note:**

> comment 2 get me to write this lab report im putting off
> 
> (also come hmu on [tumblr](http://gaynasas.tumblr.com/) to talk abt this garbage show)


End file.
